1. Technical Field
This invention relates generally to selection from a plurality of a document production apparatus such as copiers and printers.
2. Background Art
Local area networks have been provided to allow user interfaces such as work station terminals to be connected to a plurality of peripheral devices, such as copiers and printers (herein collectively referred to as "document production apparatus") to allow more than one network user to share the devices.
Modern copiers and printers, such as those having electrostatographic marking engines, may be configured for a particular job by the operator selecting from available setup parameters. The variable setup parameters which are available differ from marking engine to marking engine, and may include both job-level features and page-level features. Such features may include collation mode, accent color, image processing, image reversal, center shift, reduction/enlargement, paper supply selection, blanking, framing, image shift, collation, simplex/duplex, image combine, highlighting, lead edge erase, etc.
The selection process generally does not take much time, as most users find that the default parameter settings are usually desired, with possibly only a few changes to be made. Some jobs, however, require substantial operator input and time to configure the document production apparatus as desired. These time consuming entries will tie-up the document production apparatus while the operator make his or her selections on an integral user interface such as an operator control panel.
Systems are known wherein the operator can make setup parameter selections off-line at a remote user interface, freeing the document production apparatus for use by others while the selections are being made. Once made, the setup parameter selections are communicated to the document production apparatus by portable memory (magnetic disc or card, keysheet, etc.) or by direct communication (local area network or hard wire).
Many local area networks have more than one document production apparatus available for use, some of which may be better suited than others to run a particular job, either because of availability or because of the present configuration of setup parameters. That is, one document production apparatus may already be configured according to (or close to) the setup parameters desired. It would be very useful for the operator to be provided with a list of available document production apparatus, together with their configurations of setup parameters.